Where Did Power View Go in Excel 2016?

If you’ve been using the Excel 2016 Preview or just Excel 2016 (depending on when you read this), you may have noticed that there is no longer an option to insert a Power View report into o workbook. The reason is that it has been removed from the default ribbon in Excel 2016. It used to be on the Insert tab in the Reports Section, right beside Power Map.

Power View in Excel 2013

However, opening the Insert tab in Excel 2016 reveals it to be missing.

Power View Missing in Excel 2016

Did Microsoft remove Power View from Excel? What’s going on? Power View is still very much a part of Excel; the only change is that now it is no longer a default ribbon option. The good news is that it’s simple enough to add it back in. To do so, we need to edit the ribbon. Click on File-Options, and then select Advanced Options. The ribbon editor will appear. We can add Power View to any tab that we would like, or even create a new one, but here we’re just going to add it back to the Insert menu. To do so, expand the Insert menu. Each command must be added to a group, so we need to click the “New Group” button. Next, because I don’t think anyone will want their group named “New Group”, we want to rename it. In this case, we’ll rename it to “Reports”, the way that it used to be.

Adding a new group to the Insert tab

Next, we need to add Power View into the group. The easiest way to do this is to select “Commands Not in the Ribbon” from the “Choose commands from” dropdown. It’s a long list of items to choose from, and you’ll be tempted to look under “P” for Power View. You will be disappointed. The correct command is actually to be found in the “I”s, and it is “Insert a Power View Report”. Select that option, and click the “Add” button.

Once this is complete, Power View should once again appear in the Insert tab, in the Reports section.

I have no idea why Power View has been removed from the ribbon by default. It may just be temporary given that we’re not yet at release, but it could signal some other change. In any event, if you work with both Power View and Excel 2016, you can continue to do so.

very useful. I have managed to install the button but nothing happen when I click on it. Any idea why? I have read somewhere else that it could be related to the package that you have. In my case I have the top package and it still does not work.

I inserted the “insert a new powerview report” command but power view does not launch nor it can read old powerview reports. I have microsoft office 365 2016 professional plus 64 bit and Microsoft Silverlight (64-bit) Version: 5.1.41212.0 and 64 bit windows 10. What I am missing here? Thanks

I’m a Power View newbie, so I thought I’d check it out. Its told me to install Silverlight. However from what I know Silverlight is an end-of-life technology, not so? Why would M’soft still rely on that? If so, I’ll battle to get my Stalinist IT department to allow me to install it.

Hey Walt… PowerView is pretty much end of life too. I wouldn’t bother. If I were you I’d focus solely on Power BI or use the built in Visuals. In fact Excel is getting the Power BI visuals soon too – no need for Power BI